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Sunday, October 3, 2010

Random thoughts...

I just read that the B.C. Lions are in pursuit of clinching their 14th consecutive play off appearance. Wow. I'm at a solid 8.5 on the envy scale right now. During a breather at Rock on the Range this summer, my buddy Dan and I noticed a banner on the west side grand stand, listing the years of all the Bombers Grey Cup wins. We observed that the Blue haven't won a cup since '90....every other franchise, with the exception of Saskatchewan (who should have won last year) and Hamilton, has won at least two cups since that time. Just disappointing.

Rock on the Range, which, if you didn't know, took place in August at Canad Inn Stadium, was a gong show for obvious reasons. However, I went into the all day affair thinking that I would see, or be in, at least seven fights, and/or witness 700 people pass out from too much of the sauce. It turned out to be as peaceful as Woodstock...the 1969 version of course, and not the 1999 version, where Fred Durst literally urged people to "break shit."

Reason why Rock on the Range was as peaceful as the Garden of Eden, before Eve enticed Adam to eat the proverbial fruit, of course, was the insanely high price, and strict limit of alcohol. We're talking 6$ drinks, one drink per person, and no double shots. Oh, and there were only maybe 10 bars in the whole stadium to cater to the 15,000 plus in attendance. Even if you could chug two drinks at once, you'd be stone sober by the time you could make your way to the front of the liquor line. In my opinion, a brilliant strategy for safety and security.

With that being said, I wish I'd been incoherently intoxicated for the bands Crash Karma and Stone Temple Pilots. More on that another time.

Last thing here...I sometimes try to come up with theories for phenomenon's in pop culture . My installment for today: the backwards baseball hat.

I don't literally mean a backwards baseball hat, or "cap," I mean when did it become popular or common place for kids, mostly, to sport their caps with the brim behind the head? After seconds of research, I'm going to give the credit to one man: Ken Griffey, Jr.

Junior Griffey was easily the most popular athlete on the planet in the early-to-mid 90's. Obviously Michael Jordan was already an icon, but he retired from the NBA in '93 to pursue a career in minor league baseball. So Junior took a seat at the head of the table as the athlete most kids looked up to. He was young, cool, confident, and the best player in the game. His name sake was on the one of the most iconic sports video games of all time, "Ken Griffey, Jr. Presents Major League Baseball." (this game is hilarious because it wasn't sanctioned by the MLB Players Association, so the game had to make up fictitious names for the players.) And he wore the redesigned MLB hat backwards.

Done. A culture was born. I remember begging my Dad to take me a now defunct sporting goods store on Pembina Hwy to buy me a fitted MLB Toronto Blue Jays hat with the logo on the back. As soon as that sucker was swiped and paid for, I ripped off the tags on threw that bad boy on my melon backwards style, just like Junior.

PS. Speaking of Junior, as in the name, I recently found out that the characters in the Disney film, Cool Runnings, are completely made up. That hurt a little.